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The 9 biggest 9/11 stories of 2011: old fights and new directions

By Craig McKee

Paul Simon stepped to the microphone at Ground Zero and something amazing happened.

The legendary singer/songwriter had been asked to sing the non-threatening Bridge Over Troubled Waters at the ceremony for 9/11’s 10th anniversary ceremonies in New York, but he didn’t. Instead, he launched into a haunting version of another classic that begins, “Hello darkness, my old friend.” Simon had decided that the most appropriate statement for this occasion would come from The Sound of Silence.

“Fools”, said I, “You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows…

Was he protesting the fact that firefighters had not been allowed to attend the ceremony, or was it even deeper, that the real truth about 9/11 was not being spoken? I don’t know, but his choice was not an accident.

This was the most emotional 9/11 moment of the year and possibly the most encouraging. The “acceptable” mainstream response to the anniversary of this dark day was a kind of contrived solemnity (I mean media, government officials, and the like – not the public). It was propaganda that did not honour the victims – it sought to bury the truth about what happened to them.

This 10th anniversary year was a significant one in the fight for 9/11 truth. I include the anniversary and everything that came with it as one of my nine biggest 9/11 stories of the year. That includes the phony media build-up and all the bogus retrospectives designed to tug at our emotions and bypass our brains.

Here are the other key 9/11 stories as I saw them (in no particular order). I’m sure readers have more, and some may disagree with the ones I’ve chosen. I look forward to your input about what mattered to you in 2011:

2) Gage bails on Citizen Investigation Team, ignores rebuke: The founder of Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, Richard Gage, shocked many in the movement in February when he released a statement withdrawing support for the Pentagon research of CIT and their founders, Craig Ranke and Aldo Marquis. Gage had offered an endorsement of their work, but had subsequently come under heavy pressure to denounce them and their film National Security Alert.

Apparently Gage caved to this pressure, because in February he released a statement posted on 911blogger.com (the site that has banned most CIT supporters and whose contributors delight in bashing CIT unopposed).

Gage made the incredible statement that despite being initially impressed by National Security Alert, he later was “surprised” to learn that the witnesses who contradicted the official flight path also said they did see the plane hit the building. This was an odd thing to say given that the witnesses say this clearly in the film.

Gage’s statement endorsed the research of such dubious names as Chris Sarns, Victoria Ashley, Jim Hoffman, Frank Legge, Warren Stutt, Jeff Hill, and Gregg Roberts. In doing so, he threw his weight behind the idea that we can’t prove a 757 didn’t hit the Pentagon and that one probably did. He would have been much better to stay out of the Pentagon discussion altogether. The cause and Gage’s credibility have suffered.

In the end, Gage suggests we stick to the idea that a 757 should not have been able to hit the Pentagon and avoid saying the no 757 hit. In other words, allow incompetence as an explanation, thereby letting the perpetrators off the hook.

In April, a group of 27 truthers (I was one) wrote Gage a letter protesting his actions and calling on him to explain his shocking embrace of the anti-CIT hit squad. He never replied.

3) 9/11 patsy Osama bin Laden is “killed” by U.S. special forces: At the beginning of May, the American media reported that the mastermind of 9/11 had been killed by U.S. special forces in a raid on his compound in Islamabad, Pakistan. No reporters questioned whether this was true or not; they just reported it as fact. And it happened just in time for the 10th anniversary commemorations of 9/11. How convenient.

And Barack Obama, clearly the darling of big money and the global elite, got the credit for this momentous accomplishment. After all, the government had been hunting bin Laden all those years, right? How clever of him to hide in a large, highly fortified compound a short distance from a Pakistani military installation.

Where does one begin with a story this transparently bogus? To start with, the story changed almost hourly. First it was a firefight with bin Laden being armed. Then he was unarmed. He used his wife as a shield. Then he didn’t.

The most obvious thing was that the body was dumped at sea, supposedly in keeping with Islamic tradition. How religiously tolerant of them. It also saved the government from having to prove that the death had actually happened.

We were also told that plans for future 9/11-like attacks were in the works. It didn’t occur to anyone in the media to point out that killing an unarmed bin Laden (a known CIA asset whose family has ties to the Bush clan going back to the ‘70s) might make it harder to thwart these supposed attacks.

And, of course, there won’t be any messy trials that might bring out information that contradicts the 9/11 official story.

4) Gallop suit against top Bush officials thrown out of court by Bush cousin: Former U.S. Army executive administrative assistant April Gallop pursued her lawsuit against Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Gen. Richard Myers for damages in connection with injuries she and her newborn son suffered at the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.

What she didn’t know when she first launched the suit was that it would ultimately be thrown out of court on appeal by Judge John M. Walker, a cousin of George W. Bush. As you’d expect, the mainstream media ignored the story (with the exception of CNBC). Gallop’s lawyer, William Veale, tried unsuccessfully to get Walker disqualified from the case.

Gallop was at her desk when a large explosion caused the ceiling above her to collapse. When she regained consciousness, she made her way, son in tow, through the hole the alleged Flight 77 was supposed to have created. She saw no bodies, no airplane parts, no jet fuel, nothing to suggest a plane had hit the building.

Gallop launched the original lawsuit in 2008 alleging that the 9/11 attacks were planned at the highest levels of the U.S. government, and that they were blamed on fundamentalist Muslims as part of a cover story. She claims that there was plenty of knowledge that employees of the Pentagon were in imminent danger, and that had alarms been sounded many deaths and injuries would have been prevented.

5) Toronto 9/11 Hearings virtually ignore Pentagon evidence: One of the major events of the year was a set of hearings that took place in Toronto, Canada that was scheduled to coincide with the 10th anniversary of 9/11.

The idea was to have expert “witnesses” who would present compelling evidence to a trio of moderators refuting the 9/11 official story. It was decided that only the “least controversial” evidence would be considered because it would more likely lead to consensus. This meant no invitation to CIT or to native Torontonian Barrie Zwicker, a leading member of the Truth movement and avid CIT supporter.

There were numerous witnesses who presented evidence that the World Trade Center was destroyed in a controlled demolition, but the Pentagon was almost ignored. We had a 25-minute presentation about explosives in the Pentagon by Barbara Honegger and a 45-minute talk by David Ray Griffin about anomalies related to Flight 77. That’s less than an hour and a half out of a four-day event.

But there were other fascinating presenters whose focus was less on the physical science of the event and more on the psychological and political aspects (along with evidence regarding the alleged hijackers and the insider trading that preceded 9/11).

The event will result in a final report that is eagerly awaited.

CIT held a Toronto screening of National Security Alert after the hearings were over. This event was successful, drawing about 200 people.

6) Griffin looks to mend fences in the movement: David Ray Griffin published his 10th book on 9/11 this fall (9/11 Ten Years Later: When State Crimes Against Democracy Succeed), and it contained a new direction for the prolific and highly respected author. In the book’s chapter on the Pentagon, Griffin went over the case made by CIT critics that a plane did hit, and then countered that with his own arguments that none did.

Griffin’s case was the vastly stronger of the two arguments, and I credit him with not caving to the pressure to denounce CIT as Gage did. But the problem, as I saw it, was that he elevated the importance of the dubious Pentagon “research” of David Chandler, Jonathan Cole, and Frank Legge.

His new position was to put aside the “relatively unimportant” question of whether a plane hit and to concentrate on the overwhelming evidence that a 757 piloted by al-Qaeda did not. The idea, I gather, was to break the impasse created by the entrenched positions for and against CIT’s position that a plane flew towards the building but did not hit.

Griffin’s Toronto address was genuinely perplexing because it relied almost exclusively on positions put forward by Chandler, Cole, and Legge on every aspect of the Pentagon event. In doing so, he gave them a standing that they have not earned.

7) Griffin unveils 9/11 Consensus Panel: Griffin was involved in another major consensus-related initiative this year designed to create a bank of reliable information about the failings of the 9/11 official story that the media and the public can refer to.

In early September the formation of the 9/11 Consensus Panel was announced. It is an expert panel of academics, scientists, pilots, journalists, and other prominent members of the 9/11 Truth movement. The group was created to assemble a list of points that have achieved consensus status by virtue of receiving the approval of 85% of the panel.

So far, 13 points have already been agreed upon and can be read on the panel’s web site. These are hardly groundbreaking, and only one Pentagon point is listed. But more will be added, maybe hundreds more, according to co-founder Elizabeth Woodworth. The key to this effort will be adding more – and stronger – points to the list as quickly as possible.

8) Direct democracy given a chance through Citizens 9/11 Commission: One of the most promising initiatives by the Truth movement in 2011 was the effort to place a ballot initiative before voters in at least one of the 26 states that have an initiative law. This would allow voters in a given state to vote on whether or not they want a new investigation into 9/11 to be initiated.

Fronted and founded by former U.S. Senator Mike Gravel, the commission seeks to get on the ballot in one or more states for the 2012 presidential election. The effort took centre stage when Gravel gave a presentation on the Commission at the Toronto 9/11 Hearings in September.

The initial target of the project was Massachusetts, but the short time frame and lack of funds to collect signatures led the organizers redirect their focus to other states. The ones currently being targeted are Oregon, Alaska, and California.

According to the web site (9-11cc.org): “Because our established federal institutions are unable to address the unanswered questions about 9/11, we have no choice but to circumvent them. And that is why our campaign has turned to the state initiative process, the only legally constituted forum for an appeal to the people through the method of direct democracy.”

Campaign seeking to raise awareness about Building 7 expands: Remember Building 7 is a campaign launched in late 2010 using local TV ads to educate New Yorkers about Building 7, which the majority of city residents had never seen footage of. The goal of the effort is to take the ad campaign to other U.S. cities like Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

In 2011, Remember Building 7 produced new ads calling for an investigation of what happened to Building 7. There have also been print ads in New York and there will be more in the cities listed above. The fundraising goal for this campaign is $1 million. About 8% of that has been raised so far.

Campaigns like this help to show the world that this fight isn’t over, that it’s just warming up.

***

There is much more one could say about 9/11 and 2011. There was a lot of excellent research done, and much creative thinking went into finding new approaches to further the cause of 9/11 truth.

But really, the biggest ongoing story is the tragic fallout from the fake “terrorist attacks” of 2001. Many hundreds of thousands of innocent people have died in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the U.S. government is now actively preparing the way for an invasion of Iran.

In the meantime, the freedom of Americans and others around the world is being hacked away in the name of security. The powers that be create fear with false flag operations and then they ride to the rescue with new security measures to keep us safe. The problem is that this safety comes at the expense of freedoms once taken for granted.

The National Defence Authorization Act, for example, would make it legal for the government to arrest and detain anyone they want on American soil and hold them until the “end of hostilities.” In other words, they can be held forever in direct contravention of the U.S. Constitution. This erosion of freedom is only getting worse, and elected officials aren’t even pretending to care. They think the country and the world isn’t noticing what’s happening or doesn’t care.

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43 comments

Don’t wanna break the mood, however those Police and Firemen who are dying of cancer, after inhaling dust at the WTC on 911, who yet remain silent, re what they saw or heard that deviates from the official line, will be proved fools in the long run!

According to Lt Richard Smiouskas FDNY, in an interview 27 November 2001 ..following the strike on the North Tower, “an engineer got me onto the roof of WTC 2,” the South Tower, “I saw people in the windows, they weren’t jumping, they were being forced out!”

Smiouskas seems to be saying (on page 7) that people were being forced out by people behind them who may also have been trying to get to fresh air. He doesn’t imply that people are being tossed out for another reason.

The subject of people “jumping” has always troubled me, because I can’t imagine someone willingly jumping out a window unless they were suffering incredible agony – more than just heavy smoke.

Another wild-ass & bat-shit crazy option was posed by Dr. Judy Wood and has many real-world (like on OWS) operational mechanisms to prove that it may not be all of the crazy adjectives I applied at the beginning of this sentence.

Her premise was that directed energy weapons took down the towers, or did at least a lion’s share of the work: a giant microwave oven turning residual water in content (e.g., drywall, concrete) instantly into steam whose expanding volume essentially blows the containers of the water apart.

In powering up these devices, they probably tested them at reduced strength and duration, whereby such DEW would be like the crowd control devices that send energy beams at protesters and gets them moving out of the beam’s path with little hesitation. Thus, powering up DEW could send victims trapped on those floors not just to the windows for fresh air but out the windows to avoid the sensation of burning flesh.

Chemical fires? To some degree, but let us remember that none of the jumping victims (that I recall) had anything on fire: no hair, no body parts, no clothing ablaze which to me would be indications of a physical fire very close and would probably be the final motivating force for me to jump if otherwise I could get fresh air through the windows. Nope, their non-burning status indicates to me some other source of “heat” (like the “Active Denial” crowd control devices) that would be a side-effect of powering up one of their top-secret toys to dustify the towers.

Concerning Gage and Griffin : I’ve seen many comments that these two need to respond to, answer, comment on, amplify, and clarify…

We forget sometimes that they have made enormous sacrifices and contributions to educate and inform the public. They are not incredibly wealthy men. They do not always receive the appreciation they deserve. And they are certainly bombarded by the negativity that comes from “debunkers,” “deniers,” and those supporting the “official, NIST” story.

They no doubt have families and loved ones who wish to spend time with them and share love. They need love. Last I heard, Griffin is in and out of the hospital. Last I saw, Gage is asking people to let him crash on their couch if it means he can give a presentation on 911 Truth. (We Are Change interview) .

I only wish to say that we can appreciate what they have done for us, and it is up to us to continue to sound the bells of dignity and justice.

I know that Dr. Griffin has had more than his share of health challenges over the past couple of years, but I know he’s back at work and contributing his wisdom to the cause. He certainly deserves any appreciation he receives.

The impression I get reading your post, and others like it, is that there is this reluctance to believe that a plane hit the Pentagon, a bias against the idea, almost as a matter of principle, as if believing a plane hit the Pentagon would represent some kind of admission of failure. It’s not as if a plane hitting the Pentagon would be a blow to the ‘911 was an inside job’ theories – planes hitting the WTC towers didn’t prevent people believing in these theories, so why does it matter in relation to the Pentagon?

And the other question is, if the Pentagon, or anyone else, were to prove a plane hit the Pentagon, what form would the proof take?

The impression I get… is that there is this reluctance to believe that a plane hit the Pentagon, a bias against the idea, almost as a matter of principle, as if believing a plane hit the Pentagon would represent some kind of admission of failure.

Your impression is entirely off-base. From 9/11/2001 until this very date, the entire Truth Movement has desired most sincerely “to believe that a plane hit the Pentagon”. In fact, we want “to sincerely believe” most of the crap fed to us by the govt through a compliant corporate media.

The problem is, there isn’t enough substance to merit such belief. It is lies and crap. Ample amount of evidence shows how the public is being manipulated and played.

Turning this around using most of your words, here’s the impression you make on me.

There is this reluctance to believe that no plane hit the Pentagon, a bias against the idea, almost as a matter of principle, as if believing no plane hit the Pentagon represents an admission of failure.

That admission of failure — as pointed out by the reputable psychologists whom you panned on another thread (“Standing up for unpopular truths about 9/11 comes at a personal cost”) — represents a much deeper failure and a painful shattering of cherished world views. Such shattered views and beliefs include the perfection, wholesomeness, fairness, rightness, ethical, moral government of the United States of America and its leaders whom American voters (supposedly) elected to office.

The consequences of no plane hitting the Pentagon are far reaching. An ice breaker, a damn wrecker, the straw that broke the camels back. This is part of the reason why the govt has never corrected anything from its official story when new evidence, facts, and analysis were presented, because the OCT was so narrowly defined that any admission on their part to even something as mundane as the 9/11 hijackers flying under assumed identities or not being who the govt has said they were would not mesh with the lies built up in other areas and could/would/should result in an overthrowing of our federal govt as far down as it takes.

All defenders of the OCT, whether or not they were initially involved, recognize this. They aren’t stupid. They recognize lots of different aspects of the lies. But they aren’t going to talk about it. The personal consequences are too great, as would be the public blow-back to the status quo in all aspects of our society.

This is why you fight on to convince others of the OCT and those lies being truth. You’re defending your status quo and the benefits you reap therefrom.

@Señor El Once
Your statements that
‘From 9/11/2001 until this very date, the entire Truth Movement has desired most sincerely “to believe that a plane hit the Pentagon”.
and
‘The consequences of no plane hitting the Pentagon are far reaching. An ice breaker, a damn wrecker, the straw that broke the camels back.’ that ‘could/would/should result in an overthrowing of our federal govt as far down as it takes.’
don’t seem to me to be consistant, but I think answer pretty well the question I posed about why truthers seem so obsessed with this idea that a plane didn’t hit the Pentagon. And it’s very little ,it seems to me , to do with the truth. The truth is what happened. It’s not what people want to believe happened or what they want to use in order to further an agenda. Anyone looking at evidence of an event and proclaiming how believing their conclusions about what happened helps to advance their agenda is admitting to a biased and distorted assessment of that evidence. The accusation -and it really is pretty tiresome at this stage – that anyone not believing those conclusions is per se some kind of opponent of that agenda only emphesizes the distorted nature of it.
I can say that in my entire adult life I have rarely come across anything as surprising as the credence given by any sizable number of people to the idea of a plane not hitting the Pentagon and the only explanation I can come up with is how pliable and susceptible to bias and manipulation the concept of belief is.
A plan to frame people for crashing a plane into a building by first going to the inordinate lengths of pretending to crash the plane into the building, is as inane a plan as I’ve come accross. And there is no reason why anyone ,such as these CIT people ,shouldn’t agree that it’s an inane plan. The reason they think a plane flew over the Pentagon has nothing to do with how sane or otherwise they think the plan is to do it- which is just another indication of flawed evidence assessment unfortunately.

Is it too unreasonable to expect to see some wreckage of a Boeing 757 at the Pentagon if a plane had hit it?

I can assure you that if I had I seen some wreckage my position would be the same as yours Mr A Wright.
Mr Wright did you see some wreckage? Would you have concluded that a 757 had hit the Pentagon had you have not been told first what to believe by the corporate mainstream media?

The truth is what happened. It’s not what people want to believe happened or what they want to use in order to further an agenda. Anyone looking at evidence of an event and proclaiming how believing their conclusions about what happened helps to advance their agenda is admitting to a biased and distorted assessment of that evidence. The accusation -and it really is pretty tiresome at this stage – that anyone not believing those conclusions is per se some kind of opponent of that agenda only emphesizes the distorted nature of it.

I agree.

The truth is what happened. [The plane flew over the Pentagon.] It’s not what people want to believe happened. [Ala a plane crashed into the Pentagon] or what they want to use in order to further an agenda. [An agenda that first covers over the cause of the wiping out at the Pentagon of the investigators and records of the Office of Naval Intelligence who were looking into the $2.3 Trillion Dollars in unaccounted for Defense transactions alluded to by Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on September 10, 2001.] Anyone looking at evidence of an event and proclaiming how believing their conclusions about what happened helps to advance their agenda is admitting to a biased and distorted assessment of that evidence. [This applies to those blindly supporting the belief that a plane hit the Pentagon, and then using this as part of the shock-and-awe agenda to dupe us into deploying our military in two foreign countries with strategic assets, as outlined in our PNAC documents of 1999 “Rebuilding America’s Defenses” that foreshadowed both the new Pearl Harbor event as well as infiltration of cyberspace by the likes of you.] The accusation -and it really is pretty tiresome at this stage – that anyone not believing those conclusions is per se some kind of opponent of that agenda only underscores the distorted nature of it. [Distorted indeed, because I don’t know WTF you are trying to say with that sentence.]

Later, you go on to write:

A plan to frame people for crashing a plane into a building by first going to the inordinate lengths of pretending to crash the plane into the building, is as inane a plan as I’ve come across.

Thus you demonstrate how little you know about planning and risk mitigation, as you also ignore the goal of stopping the ONI investigation into $2.3 Trillion Dollars of budgetary misdeeds.

If you want to take out a select group, you isolate them, which the wing renovation ruse and move-in/occupancy schedule accomplishes. Unlike in OKC, you make damn sure to take them out. If you can’t plant the bombs, put a rocket in a construction trailer for generators outside the wing but pointed at the wing, which you later explain away as “the incoming plane grazed this trailer and knocked it from parallel parked to pointing at the hole, as illustrated here by this CGI video simulation.”

The easiest way to recruit for a “suicide airplane mission” is to tell the would-be pilots (or auto-pilots) that they get to buzz the Pentagon without actually hitting it or getting into trouble.

The easiest way to get an airplane to target specifically the Pentagon wing and its personnel in a manner assured to give focused penetration and destruction is to not involve an airplane in that aspect of the operation. The plane’s purpose is to be seen flying low just prior to the missile strike and/or planted explosions, so that witnesses will cognitively associate the plane with the explosion with the confusing plane crash data points from the WTC and Pennsylvania so that “by golly, it has to be a plane, because a plane was supposedly used elsewhere.” . [… And don’t get me started on Shanksville or September Clues fake pixel planes at the WTC.]

The easiest way to send a stern message to a group of people (e.g., military, intelligence agencies, Congress) to get on board with an agenda is to target a select group of them: “You are either with us or against us.” The missile strike/explosions on the ONI was the cake, while Anthrax on Congress and the media was the icing. Punish the whistleblowers. If members of those groups (e.g., military, intelligence agencies, Congress) weren’t in on the initial operation, patriotism and the media spin was duping them into support the resulting military escalations, despite vast weaknesses and illegalities in its justification that included lying about WMD in the target strategic countries.

Thus, Mr. Wright, we see that your comments about the “the plan being inane” really only reflects how limited your thinking and imagination are.

You further wrote:

The reason they think a plane flew over the Pentagon has nothing to do with how sane or otherwise they think the plan is to do it- which is just another indication of flawed evidence assessment unfortunately.

To which I re-write into being:

The reason you think a plane flew into the Pentagon has nothing to do with how sane or otherwise you think the plan is to do it. [It has to do with the corporate media and its waiting-in-the-wings media witnesses telling you on the telly they saw a plane and saw an explosion and connected dots.] Believing that a plane hit is just another indication of flawed evidence assessment unfortunately [because the case for a plane hitting the Pentagon was not made by the govt and was screwed up by many anomalies. Insufficient plane wreckage, wreckage not identified and matched, confiscation of surveillance videos, slow-walking the release of any video footage (a few frames), inconclusive video footage, NOC witnesses.]

@Socrates
I saw photos of wreakage of a plane at the Pentagon. I heard the statements from the people who had to go in to the building afterwards saying that there was wreakage and that there were bodies that they recovered and that were identified. Should I make some assumption that all of the people who had to do that gruesome work, of recovering the bodies of those people , and of clearing out the plane wreakage from the building, are all lying about it? I have not heard one person who had to go into the building after the event say that they didn’t find any wreakage. I haven’t heard one of them say they didn’t find bodies of plane passengers along with bodies of Pentagon employees. They are the only people who can tell you. I haven’t heard one statement from anyone who was actually there before during or after the event in the ten years since, saying that a plane didn’t hit the Pentagon.
The corporate mainstream media reported what they were told by the people who were at the Pentagon. The first reports were that there was an explosion at the Pentagon. As reporters arrived at the scene or contacted people, the accounts of what happened emerged. There were scores of people there who saw what happened. The corporate mainstream media didn’t make it up. They reported it. The so-called ‘official impact narrative’ is the eyewitness testimony of scores of people who were there. I have never heard one account by anyone who was there who said a plane didn’t hit the Pentagon. Should I make some assumption that all of these people are lying as well? If reporters arrived at the Pentagon and spoke to the people there and they all said a great big commercial airliner crashed into the building , should they report that or should they make something up? -or maybe get on the phone to Thierry Meyssan in France to ask him what happened. Or ring Barrie Zwicker in Canada and ask him- I believe he had a good view of the event from Toronto and spent many hours inside the Pentagon recovering bodies before making his pronouncements.
Did you ever hear a member of the truth movement say that they demand to see wreakage of a Global Hawk/ A3 Skywarrior/cruise missile or they wouldn’t believe one had hit the Pentagon?
I try to imagine what would have happened if the ‘official story’ from the Government was that there was an accidental gas explosion at the Pentagon and there was no plane,- suddenly the scales would drop from the eyes and all the plane wreakage would suddenly become visible – all over the truther websites we would see photos of the wreakage of a plane, and scores of eyewitnesses saying -‘I saw a plane crashing into the Pentagon!” -the overwhelming evidence that the Government lied! The people who went in a recovered bodies , and did forensic identification of bodies identifying them as passengers on American Airlines flight 77… 100% Proof! The Government is lying!! It’s a cover-up!

Kindly provide the links to images and websites, and point out the images that convince you the most. Me personally? My study hasn’t revealed such wreckage in sufficient amounts for it to be convincing to me.

I heard the statements from the people who had to go in to the building afterwards saying that there was wreakage and that there were bodies that they recovered and that were identified. Should I make some assumption that all of the people who had to do that gruesome work, of recovering the bodies of those people , and of clearing out the plane wreakage from the building, are all lying about it?

Sure, why not? They have more motivation to go-with-the-flow and if not outright lie, then to at least parrot the official conspiracy theory. I personally have not read (or heard) that many statements from those people attending to the Pentagon, mostly because a top-down gag order was placed on the rank-and-file. So here again, kindly provide links to the testimonies you find most convincing, because maybe you are conflating testimony together from other corners of 9/11 and are cognitively faking it here.

I have not heard one person who had to go into the building after the event say that they didn’t find any wreakage. I haven’t heard one of them say they didn’t find bodies of plane passengers along with bodies of Pentagon employees. They are the only people who can tell you. I haven’t heard one statement from anyone who was actually there before during or after the event in the ten years since, saying that a plane didn’t hit the Pentagon.

Did you expect anything else? Would the statements be anything else if there were no plane?

This is the Pentagon we’re talking about.

You wrote:

The corporate mainstream media didn’t make it up. They reported it.

Not quite. They repeated what was handed to them and invited as guests “experts” & “witnesses” the govt lined up.

I don’t have the inclination to rip apart more of your posting except to say that there are few actual Pentagon witnesses to a plane crashing into the Pentagon. [But if you say so, provide the links and point out the testimony that really floats your OCT boat.]

Most saw the data point of a low-flying plane and then later the data point of an explosion followed by lots of smoke. Due to the TeeVee repetition of plane pixels in NYC and lots of rumors about other aircraft having issues, those two data points were connected into a cognitive story of plane hits building regardless of them not truly witnessing it. Nobody expected the plane hits building to be ruse, a slight-of-hand, a magician’s trick. Yet that is precisely where the evidence and the govt’s behavior lead us.

You wrote:

The Government is lying!! It’s a cover-up!

You’re right! What was you’re first clue? They’ve been lying about things and covering it over for years, decades, and centuries. Glad to see that you can finally acknowledge this point.

I have not heard one person who had to go into the building after the event say that they didn’t find any wreakage. I haven’t heard one of them say they didn’t find bodies of plane passengers along with bodies of Pentagon employees. They are the only people who can tell you. I haven’t heard one statement from anyone who was actually there before during or after the event in the ten years since, saying that a plane didn’t hit the Pentagon.

You mean, you’ve personally talked to all of these people and they all confirmed that they all saw wreckage and passengers? Actually confirmed it for yourself?

Were they all qualified to identify “plane parts”? Especially after such an allegedly incredible “impact” that totally penetrated the Pentagon?

Did the FBI or anybody release details of identification of said “plane parts”?

As for all of those people who claimed to see “passengers”, how did they differentiate between “passengers” and Pentagon workers?

How did they identify “passengers” when they were apparently blown to smithereens along with the plane?

I know of one firefighter who claimed to see a “cockpit seat”. Have you ever seen an image of this “cockpit seat”?

Were all of the “passengers” (presumably not in smithereens), still “strapped to their seats”?
If they were still strapped to their seats why did it take 6 weeks to “identify” them through autopsy?

Have you ever seen an image of JUST ONE of those seats?

How did those “seats” survive the reported inferno? The seatbelts themselves?

Did you know that the same firefighter who claimed to see a “cockpit seat” also claimed to find the alleged FDR only for it to be denied by the FBI? Did he ever comment on that?

How difficult would it be to wrap a load of old aircraft pieces around explosives/incendiary device to fool the first resonders? You do know that the Pentagon was evacuated 4 times? That 3 people were arrested for “impersonating firefighters”?

I read the transcript of the presentation given by the very first team to go into the Pentagon. This presentation was given on the evening of the event, late at night on television.

Regretfully this transcript has since vanished from the web, and as much as I hate to admit it now, you will have to take my word for it…unless someone out there has this transcript saved to file. I did in my previous computer which mysteriously broke it’s link with the core software in 2008.

But to the transcript, first we have Rumsfeld introducing the Nave Audio Visual Team, who were the first unit allowed inside to photograph the damage. After that intro, the leader of the team is narrating as he shows slides. One of the very first things he says, and tells those at this news con will be shown in the slides is that there was absolutely nothing in there that would indicate that an airliner had gone into the building – no seats, no corpses, no luggage, no airplane parts – nothing.

He goes on to describe the slides he is showing [not pictured in the transcript] where he discribes the damage of the interior, all of it ‘building damage’ – of particular interest to this team was a puncture hole on the inner ring facing the inside mall area. It was described as an almost perfectly circular hole about six foot in diameter. To his mind this suggested a hardened nose of perhaps a missile, but there was no material beyond this hole that could be said to be what had gone through it.

Like I mentioned this was a transcript from the night of the eleventh.

Now later, I found to my surprise photographic evidence on the web that DID show parts of aircraft including an airplane seat, luggage and ripped metal parts that could be said to be airplane parts.

The question is which is true?

Anyone who knows why OJ Simpson was acquitted of his wife’s murder knows that it is because the very first forensic photos showed clear shots of the white carpeted stairway – with no bloodstains.
Subsequently other pictures show clearly a trail of blood going up the same stairs…and it was determined to actually be Simpson’s blood.

How did his blood get on the stairs after the first team of forensic detectives left the crime scene?

How did airplane parts get in the Pentagon after the first forensic audio-visual team left the building?

It is a no-brainer in both instances – one some people would be willing to admit [such as the jury in the Simpson case] and one others will reject without hesitation: The blood – and the airplane parts were planted afterwards.

I understand that I am just someone blogging on a website ten years after the fact, and there is no reason for anyone to accept this as apparently the transcript has been utterly scrubbed.
Some things are THAT important to the official myth.
ww

I heard something interesting in the MSM 2 weeks ago; It was a statistic.

It is likely that America’s military budget was going to be cut at the beginning of the new millennium due to zero significant enemies being present.

Instead in the ten years since 9/11 the US military budget has increased 40% and if that doesn’t include the budget for homeland security and the surveillance and monitoring of US citizens, it is likely the cost of that would add another 2 or 3 hundred billion to the total.

Rumsfeld created an “Office Of Special Plans’ after 9/11, I wonder if there is a special budget to pay for and co-opt international prominent MSM friendly 9/11 truthers into believing a 757 did hit the Pentagon and then provide them with a voice in the MSM or alternative media to spread the propaganda?

Perhaps a prominent 9/11 truther who believes a plane did hit the Pentagon might like to explain why?

You ask, “Perhaps a prominent 9/11 truther who believes a plane did hit the Pentagon might like to explain why?”

I believe you may be interested in what Michael Hoffman’s views are on the Pentagon. He has been warning from very early on that he is convinced that the plane did hit the Pentagon, even though he is a strong proponent for the explosions in the WTC.

He essentially see’s the no plane at Pentagon scenario as a ‘sting’, or a set-up in which the government will offer indisputable proof, which would – he asserts, destroy the credibility of the entire movement. I have URLs to his site on this, but am a bit scattered in file keeping.

Let me say for the record that I personally cannot accept that a 757 crashed into the Pentagon.

My case is simple and rests on the size of the hole of penetration prior to the ‘collapse’ of the walls obscured it. Now that hole – before the other portion collapsed…I find it impossible a jet that size going into that hole. But even more, I have a hard time accepting that the aluminum aircraft could have punched through that wall at all. I can envision the craft crumpling and then the hard titanium engines hitting at their respective distances…but, whoops, that would mean two holes, you see the engines were ON, they are what propel the aircraft, the aircraft isn’t just carrying them along for the ride.

The photographic evidence of the pre-collapse entry point, in my view precludes the possibility of a 757 entering the Pentagon, regardless of any other factor.

So it is the engines that have the thrust in this scenario. Are you following this? As the aircraft meets the wall, there is no sufficient force to change the momentum of these powerful engines, that are, again – the driving force. The wings could not draw those engines in, even if the wings themselves were “folding back”. All of the considerations of aerodynamics ends at the wall of the Pentagon – simple momentum takes their place.

I think you mean Jim Hoffman. He is part of the group of “planers” that includes David Chandler, Jonathan Cole, Gregg Roberts, Frank Legge, Warren Stutt, Victoria Ashley, Justin Keogh, and Kevin Ryan. According to David Ray Griffin’s new book, Hoffman suggests that the reason there is no mark where the tail section would have hit might be due to an explosive that was located in the tail and which went off prior to contact. Is it just me or does that seem really looney?

I’ve been going through some of my past files and docs, looking for a clear pic of the hole before the collapse of the rest of the wall at the Pentagon.

I have read claims that this hole was as large as 60 feet in diameter by some on blogs. That is not my recollection. It seems to keep growing as time goes on..??

As far as Hoffman postulating an exploding tale – he obviously sees the weakness of the plane hit argument because it does not fit the photographic evidence. When the premier plane crash investigator for the Air Force says that there is not substantial evidence of a plane crash at the Pentagon, I give him substantial credibility.

Just for the record, what is your opinion as to the size of the original pre-collapse hole?
My estimate is less than 30 feet in diameter. But it has been some time since I last visited the question. I’m still going back through my older files and jpgs…

I’ve never tried to measure the hole from photos, but the figures I’ve read most put the whole at 20 feet or less across. David Chandler and Frank Legge say in one of their papers that the whole was large enough to accommodate a 757. That’s one of the reasons I don’t take them seriously. Beyond the width of the hole, there is also the clear lack of damage even once the wall had collapsed.

Here are some photos I’ve used in past posts. They may not indicate the exact width of the hole, but they certainly make the contention that a plane crashed there look foolish.

I just found two large format jpgs of the Pentagon prior to the collapse of the upper stories.
I cannot see that hole as any larger than 30 feet in diameter. Certainly it is no taller than 30 ft.
Smoke obscures a clear view of the left edge, but the right edge is plainly seen. If one follows the arc of that edge to the top, and continues that arc to represent the left edge, we are left with an approximate 30 foot diameter.

The engines are set some 62 feet apart from diameter edge to far diameter edge. So the impact of these engines would have been that far apart. In my view, only the hardened strength of these titanium engines could possible penetrated the hardened walls of the Pentagon.

I remain convinced that a 757 did not crash into the Pentagon, regardless of witness testimony, and any other evidence advanced post 9/11 – such as presumed photo’s of crash victims, airplane seats, whatever. First it has to be possible for the aircraft to bury itself within the building for any of these other assertions to have merit. The diameter of the original hole precludes any of this.
ww

The hole which we are talking about if I am not mistaken is beyond the first exterior wall and could be in the third wall from the exterior [middle wall]. I don’t think the hole was created by flight 77 and is much more likely to have been a bomb.

Regarding the sting theory, if that was the only anomaly on September 11 2001 well then we could get ourselves stung. However there is overwhelming evidence that the three towers in New York were a controlled demolition so therefore our suspicion of an inside job is not suddenly going to disappear.

Even if they [The Pentagon] could prove that flight 77 did hit the Pentagon [which I know they can’t] they would still have a lot more explaining to do.

Thank you Craig for your input on this subject.

PS: Raymond Geisler is doing a great job with his radio show titled ‘Unbought and Unbossed’ Canada has got many commendable 9/11 truthers. This quote was brought to my attention by Raymond on his show.

George Massey

“They must find it difficult those who have taken authority as the truth rather than truth as the authority”

Taken from ‘Zeitgeist the movie’ on religion, but just as effective when the ‘Official Version’ of 9/11 is accepted as the authority and peddled by authority.

I watched the movie when it was released but missed this very important quote.

“The hole which we are talking about if I am not mistaken is beyond the first exterior wall and could be in the third wall from the exterior [middle wall]. I don’t think the hole was created by flight 77 and is much more likely to have been a bomb.”

No, I am discussing the entry hole in the front of the Pentagon. I am aware of the interior hole [C- Ring} that looks out upon the inner plaza, which is a troubling item for the plane story.

As far as the rest of it, I still don’t think the ‘aircraft’ that hit the Pentagon is the alleged airliner. There are airplane parts that have been taken as “curios” and put in a “9/11 Museum” that supposedly came from this crash, portions of landing gears, rotor parts claimed to be part of the engines and such. Each one of these should be forensic evidence and definitely identified by their ID numbers. However this has not been done. As far as we know, even the purported black box from the site could be a “stand in” with the data created on a flight simulator.

As you say, nothing from the Pentagon annuls any of the other overwhelming evidence provided by other aspects of this case. As the Pentagon is military property, under complete control of that military, whatever mysteries remain are clearly in their court to resolve. As they continue to refuse to do so, they continue to be suspect.
ww

For the record I dispute the visual interpretation of some of this analysis.

In particular the authors assertions as to what is seen in:

#5 The earliest Jason Ingersoll photo (ca. 9:40am)

Specifically the three arrows pointing at an area in the lower left side of the photo with the words, “Fires inside the building visible.” – This is in fact not so clearly the case as the author asserts, and it is my interpretation that the fires are on the outside of the building in this photo.

I am afraid I am going to have to admit that this assessment appears very plausible.

As incredible as it seems – the idea that a 757 could so entirely vanish into a building like that – the analysis of the damage seems to show that the wound area is indeed large enough to reconsider my earlier impressions.

I will also give credit where due, and say to Mr. Wright that this is one of the first times I have been persuaded to change my mind – at least to the point of saying I am going to give the issue of the Pentagon a lot further thought.

The photo that I disputed: #5 The earliest Jason Ingersoll photo (ca. 9:40am,
is, I think resolved from a look at: #1: The Will Morris photo / the first photo on the page that shows the area from another angle, which indeed appears to show interior fires. It is not totally conclusive, but to my eye seems to be fires inside, rather than immediately in front of the structure.

From the calculations and plotting on this page we are referring to; ‘Pentagon — Exterior Impact Damage’ by someone going as, “stjarna” – “The WIDTH of the hole appears to be 96 feet”, “The width of the area of visible damage 141 feet, “The width of the area impacted by the wings 160 feet.”

While admitting that this photo analysis is somewhat compelling – I nevertheless remain troubled by the lack of verifiable airplane parts in the visible wreckage…especially the tail of the aircraft which has inexplicably disappeared as if by magic. It very well may be that there are some optical illusions – fire is a hard one to place in perspective simply due to its nature as a light source. And of course we can never rule out some sort of subtle digital alterations via Photoshop.

To be perfectly clear, I am not in a state of total capitulation in regard to this issue, I am however less certain and must consider all of this further.

I would suggest that all involved should take a very close look at the analysis at the web page in question and come to their own conclusions.

Just a few other remarks here as to the, ‘Pentagon — Exterior Impact Damage’ page.

I would like to note that it is ONLY the measurements that seem to indicate a wider opening that has persuaded me to rethink the situation. As far as some of the other analysis, I would say that the author is leading the witness in his descriptions of the damage to the ‘facade’, this damage does not necessarily equate to marks or damages caused by an airplane impact, but could very well be fire damage, plus concussive damage from any number of possible energy pressures.

Even if the entrance ‘hole’ is settled to be as large as this analysis claims, there are many questions remaining. Some of these I mention in my response to Socrates above.

The issue still remains as to the utter and complete annihilation of the craft in question, often referred to as being ‘vaporized’ – which begs the question of biological forensics being possible.
The single photo alleged to be of a victim from the crash {a charred torso and head} could be anyone, and perhaps a person already in the Pentagon.

I remain convinced that whatever hit the Pentagon had to have been remotely controlled, as the feat was beyond human piloting capabilities, and certainly not Hanjur, proven to be a total hack pilot. I have a hard time believing it was Flt 77 even if it turns out it was a large airplane.

The mystery continues – and only because there has not been an open and thorough forensic investigation into any of the aspects of the 9/11 event.

I don’t know if it is just a temporary glitch or what but on two attempts now I have accessed the “36 Truth Leaders” column, to find it is truncated at the end, clipping off at the beginning of a post by Mr. Once…???

Are you aware of the problem, or is it just something on my end of things here? Maybe a WordPress problem?

The overall photo evidence still does not indicate that an airplane struck the building. Where is the tail? The size of the hole remains inconclusive in my mind regardless of the presentation offered by the author. The fact remains that the fascia of the Pentagon does not indicate damage by an aircraft. Where is the tail?

We are shown a portion of damage showing where the extension of the wings beyond the engines supposedly struck, leaving such slight damage to the wall, and absolutely no indication of the wing parts that would have to have remained outside of those walls. Where is the tail?

Note as well that in the photos showing such damage the storm fence is not tugged inward towards the building, but is in fact yanked outward towards the auto on fire in the shot. This is counter-intuitive to an inward crash, and would rather suggest an outward explosion.

Just as troubling in all of the photos in this sequence is the large spools standing right in the supposed path of the airplane. It is impossible considering the angle the plane had to have been at to have left these spools undisturbed.

The clincher however is the fact that Flt. 77 did not fly on 9/11, information coming directly from American Airlines.

I have been wanting to find a site where decent and constructive debates and discussions about 9/11 can take place.
I was in the dark until 2005 and have weeded through many hours of video and written text. I’ve cast the far-fetched ignorance aside. There is one official video of the south tower impact, in stop frame motion, you can see the barrier of impact, and it’s as fake as it gets.
Explosions, well, there certainly were some, but I don’t believe they were caused by commercial jets. I also agree with the Theresa Renaud fraud, her story, and I’ve analyzed it several times, is just so contradictory to what a person would have said, not knowing that there was an “impact” on the North tower. Also, Matt Liar of NBC’s story doesn’t cut it either, you go to Rockefeller Plaza in NYC and look south towards the WTC Complex and tell me how much of it is obscured by the NYC skyline, THEN, go INSIDE the NBC studios where Matt Liar was and see how much of the WTC complex you can see. Oh, and don’t say that Matt Liar “just saw a plane circling the building” on a cc tv because we all saw the same shot on the NBC broadcast, AND, if NBC HAS video of a plane circling ANY buildings other than the WTC towers on 9/11 at the time of impact, I think that video would be of great importance to our government.
The recent revelations as to the phone calls to Ted Olson from Barbara.
When there is evidence brought forth in a federal trial against an alleged terrorist that contradicts the very statements that the US Government is using as the official story for 9/11 and NO ONE does anything about it, well, it pretty much sums up the kind of candy-asses most people in this country are.
I don’t know who IS responsible for the events of 9/11, but I’m 110% positive that on the judgement day, it ain’t gonna be Bin Laden on the chopping block for it!
The absurdity that 20 people were able to infiltrate and perfectly execute, out-wit, confuse and disable every single measure put into place to guard against such an attack on US soil!
I’m as infuriated about this ignorance and the common belief in it today as I was the first day that my eyes were TRULY opened to the fact that we had been lied to, and I have written several drafts on this.
I am currently working on a complete timeline of the 9/11 events.
I am barely 2 hours into the events of 9/11 on this paper, and already the ignorance and lack of response is baffling.
To give you an idea of the incompetence that was practiced on 9/11, just this past week, 04-16thru20-2012, a dual engine Cessna with only the pilot aboard was intercepted within 20 minutes of losing contact, 2 fighters were dispatched and directed to it’s location, the coast guard was contacted and dispatched and the fighters followed it until it crashed.
Question; Where in the hell were THESE competent people on 9/11? And do not recite protocol to me, the same protocol was in place ON 9/11, as can be evidenced in the Payne Stewart incident which happened BEFORE 9/11. SAME PROTOCOL!
Another revelation; Last year on national television, during the much anticipated Bush 9/11 special, Condi Rice said “the terrorists had scrambled the presidents cell phone” and she couldn’t get in touch with him. REALLY, this was brand new information! We need an investigation as to HOW a criminal mastermind operating out of a cave in Afghanistan could have pulled off such an incredible feat, because it was NEVER mentioned in the 9/11 Commission Report, nor was anyone aware of it until last year when Condi revealed it. Were the 19 hijackers responsible for this? If so, HOW? Perhaps it was Moussaui or perhaps Khalid, wait, Khalid is dead, no he isn’t, he was brought back from the dead and now resides in Gitmo.
WAKE THE HELL UP PEOPLE, YOU OR YOUR FAMILY COULD BE NEXT!!

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Plato on shadows

Those who are able to see beyond the shadows and lies of their culture will never be understood let alone believed by the masses. – Plato

Choosing dictatorship

A society whose citizens refuse to see and investigate the facts, who refuse to believe that their government and their media will routinely lie to them and fabricate a reality that is contrary to verifiable facts, is a society that chooses and deserves the police state dictatorship it is going to get. – Ian Williams Goddard

The stages of truth

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
– Arthur Schoepenhauer

Origin of the term ‘False Flag’

The term originated in the days of naval warfare. Ships would hoist the flag of their enemy, enabling them to approach closer to enemy ships than otherwise they could. They then could open fire with the advantage of surprise. The combination of secrecy and deception is a hallmark of all false flag operations.
The definitional issues of false flag go well beyond the two components mentioned above and will be tackled in Part 3. The false flag phenomenon encompasses false flag events, pseudo events, front organizations and players (agents). In the events category the not-always-reliable Wikipedia provides a good definition:
False flag operations are covert operations (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_operation) conducted by governments, corporations, or other organizations […] designed to deceive the public in such a way that the operations appear as if they are being carried out by other entities. […] False flag operations are not limited to war and counter-insurgency operations, and have been used in peace-time; for example, during Italy's strategy of tension (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategy_of_ tension).
Outcomes are one criterion for classifying false flag events, pseudo events, fronts and agents. The strategy of tension, mentioned in the Wikipedia definition, includes all four forms. Ironically a pretty good explanation of the outcomes criterion can be found on an anti-Truther site, Skeptoid:*
If one were to work solely from [“conspiracy hotbeds”] it would be easy to get the impression that our recent history is jammed with prefabricated incidents designed to enable our government to grab more power, take away the rights of the common people and/or line their already fattened pockets.
You got it right there, Skeptoid.
• http://skeptoid.com/blog/2013/01/21/false-flag-attacks-myth-and-reality/
.– Barrie Zwicker

Exposing the lies

The World-Wide 9/11 Truth movement is currently the largest investigative journalism project on the planet. – Barrie Zwicker

On conspiracy theories

Every time someone makes fun of the idea of “conspiracy theories” they are exhibiting a conditioned response – like salivating when they hear a bell or believing a TV news program. – Craig McKee

Reach Craig by email

It took long enough, but Truth and Shadows now has its own email for those of you wanting to send messages to me that aren't intended for the comments section. To reach me, email truthandshadows@yahoo.com.
Some of you already have been using my personal email to reach me with blog related messages or questions, and you can certainly continue to do that if you wish. - Craig McKee